knew he had committed he’d have needed half a dozen lives to crowd his sentences into, besides another half-dozen to carry to the gallows. However, he had decidedly the right sort of backing—enough to buy him everything he needed in the way of witnesses, alibis, even juries, and—so the talk went—an occasional judge.
I don’t know what went wrong with his support that one time he was convicted up North and sent over for a one-to-fourteen-year hitch; but it adjusted itself promptly, for the ink was hardly dry on the press notices of his conviction before he was loose again on parole.
“Is Cudner in town?”
“Don’t know,” Dick said, “but this Orrett, or Quinn, or whatever his name is, is surely hunting for him. In Rick’s place, at ‘Wop’ Healey’s and at Pigatti’s. ‘Porky’ Grout tipped me off. Says Orrett doesn’t know Cudner by sight, but is trying to find him. Porky didn’t know what he wants with him.”
This Porky Grout was a dirty little rat who would sell out his family—if he ever had one—for the price of a flop. But with these lads who play both sides of the game it’s always a question of which side they’re playing when you think they’re playing yours.
“Think Porky was coming clean?” I asked.
“Chances are—but you can’t gamble on him.”
“Is Orrett acquainted here?”
“Doesn’t seem to be. Knows where he wants to go but has to ask how to get there. Hasn’t spoken to anybody that seemed to know him.”
“What’s he like?”